There’s a suspicion that armour-piercing, radioactive weapons are being deployed by foreign forces on Libya. The U.S. says ‘it’s not aware’ depleted uranium’s being used, while the UK’s flatly denying it. Political observer Christoph Hoerstel says NATO’s chief members have a habit of using uranium weapons – and it’s likely Libya’s in line.

Marine base Camp Pendleton — one of the largest military bases in the country — is reportedly on high alert after three Middle Eastern men tried to enter the base last weekend on multiple occasions in multiple vehicles. And while the men initially claimed they didn’t know each other and simply took a wrong turn, new information from a local gas station about “hateful comments” and “terrorist threats” casts doubt on their story:

According to a Be On the Lookout (BOLO) alert issued to high-ranking Camp Pendleton officials, someone reported hearing hateful comments and terrorist threats from three men at a gas station in Oceanside Saturday.

Investigators at Camp Pendleton said the men asked the attendant for directions on how to get to Camp Pendleton before they left the gas station.

According to the alert, shortly after midnight Sunday, a rented silver Toyota Corolla driven by Naeem attempted to enter Camp Pendleton through the main gate. As it was being searched, Petrossian and Avanosian drove up in a black Mercedes, but were told to wait. Instead, they continued past the gate and onto the base. Following a short pursuit, the Mercedes was stopped and searched.

No weapons or contraband were found in the Mercedes, but base security noticed the air bag in the steering wheel of the Mercedes had been pulled out and re-attached with duct tape and had wires hanging free, the alert said.

The brave Japanese workers who sprung into action to stop a nuclear meltdown at earthquake-ravaged plant say they won’t survive repeated exposure to dangerous radiation.

Workers at the disaster-stricken Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan say they expect to die from radiation sickness as a result of their efforts to bring the reactors under control, the mother of one of the men tells Fox News.

The so-called Fukushima 50, the team of brave plant workers struggling to prevent a meltdown to four reactors critically damaged by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, are being repeatedly exposed to dangerously high radioactive levels as they attempt to bring vital cooling systems back online.

Speaking tearfully through an interpreter by phone, the mother of a 32-year-old worker said: “My son and his colleagues have discussed it at length and they have committed themselves to die if necessary to save the nation.

“He told me they have accepted they will all probably die from radiation sickness in the short term or cancer in the long-term.”

The woman spoke to Fox News on the condition of anonymity because, she said, plant workers had been asked by management not to communicate with the media or share details with family members in order to minimize public panic.

A spokesman for plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. says the company doesn’t believe any drinking water supply is affected.

FUKUSHIMA, Japan — Officials with the company that operates Japan’s tsunami-stricken nuclear plant say radioactive contamination in groundwater underneath a reactor has been measured at 10,000 times the government health standard.

37% of government employees are unionized compared to 8% of private sector employees. Cash-strapped governments are on the verge of bankruptcy, and can’t cut headcounts in the government bureaucracies because special union protections.

Should government employees be exempt from down-sizing when the rest of us in the private sector have no such special protections? Should this privilege be paid for by tax payers?

Check out justpiper.com for more information on the debate currently raging on in Wisconsin.

~ Thank you to Jason for the glowing review of this site. That is what makes doing all of this worthwhile! We shall have a partnership for a very long time and I am here to tell you that circle is very small for me, those I hold dear to years of making this website what it is. Here’s to looking forward to that exact type of relationship with you! ~JP

More on the Wisconsin travesty:

* The One Opinion Piece the New York Times Didn’t Want You To Read

–by Governor Scott Walker

In nearly every state across America, Governors are facing major budget deficits. Many, Democrat and Republican alike, are cutting state aid to schools and other local governments – which will force massive layoffs, massive property tax increases or both.

In Wisconsin, we are doing something progressive in the best sense of the word. We are implementing reforms to protect middle class jobs and middle class taxpayers. While our idea may be a bold political move it is a very modest request of our employees.

We are reforming the bargaining system so our state and local governments can ask employees to contribute 5.8% for pension and 12.6% for health insurance premiums. These reforms will help them balance their budgets. In total, our reforms save local governments more than $700 million each year.

Most workers outside of government would love our proposal. Over the past several months, I have visited numerous factories and small businesses across Wisconsin. On these tours, workers tell me that they pay anywhere from 15% to 50% of their health insurance premium costs. The average middle class worker is paying more than 20% of his or her premium.

Even federal employees pay more than twice what we are asking state and local government workers to pay and most of them don’t have collective bargaining for wages or benefits. These facts beg the question as to why the protesters are in Wisconsin and not in Washington, D.C. By nearly any measure, our requests are quite reasonable.

For me this is a very personal story and still raw. I had an absent father. My oldest daughter had an absent father.

I can attest to the pain you go through. I thought I was Scott-Free when my Dad walked out on my eighth grade graduation. I didn’t think I handled it badly because he was an ominous absent figure throughout my life beginning at ten years old. His father died & there was no one left to make him do right.

But I witnessed the volatile relationship with my youngest brother & our father. My brother became an alcoholic at age fourteen and I, having no role model on what a man ‘should’ be, made poor choices throughout my life on men I had relationships with.

In my daughter’s case, she has been damaged for 37 years by her father’s absence.

We all seem to internalize it & even if it is subconsciously, we blame ourselves. It is all the “What If’s” you carry throughout your life that slowly destroy you. ~ JP

“The father wound is so deep and so all-pervasive in so many parts of the world that its healing could well be the most radical social reform conceivable.” My friend, Father Richard Rohr, wrote that. Not only here in the West, but across the globe, disengaged fathers are leaving a mark that will forever reshape the future of our planet. You show me a person that is angry, violent, depressed, selfish, sexually immoral, hyper-driven, or one of several other personality types, and I’ll show you a father wound. Nothing is more important to a young man, or a young woman, than a father’s love, respect and acceptance.

And nothing is more damaging than when the question ‘Am I good enough?’ is asked of the father by the child, and the answer is silence.

–Justin Hunt

Absent is a new documentary by Justin Hunt which examines the need for an emotional bond that children without fathers often experience.

I wrote a letter to ‘my’ father five years after he deserted us. It was thirty-six pages long. I felt the need to represent the pain he had caused my seven siblings and myself. You would hope it would be cathartic. In fact it did feel liberating to get it on paper. I held that letter for months. I finally mailed it where he was living, remarried a thousand miles away.

About four years later, when we had a volatile meeting overseen by my oldest sister and brother, in a public park because my father was afraid of my pent up emotions exploding & being the coward he was, wanted it in the open.

The first thing he did was throw this letter in my face. Not literally. I found out when he died about fifteen years later, that he held on to that letter. It is my only hope he felt some semblance of remorse for the damage he caused.

~ JP

Write A Letter

This space is for anyone who has ever wanted to share a thought, a memory, or a question with their father but has never taken the time.

Whether he is here or gone, in your life or out of it, we invite you to say the words you’ve never said before. You may sign it or leave it anonymous, invite him to read it or write it simply to get it off of your chest. Regardless, this forum is for the children of our world, whether you’re 9 or 90, to speak directly to the person who is intended to be the greatest influence in your life, be he there or absent.

–Click the image to write a letter to your father in hopes it dispels the ghost he left you with…

In Conclusion: It is my greatest desire that many father’s out there who are abandoning their children will wake up to avoid the scars all children in this situation are besieged with. I beg you NOT to do this to your children, life is hard enough! ~ JP

President Obama has signed a secret presidential finding authorizing covert operations in Libya, a U.S. official told Fox News, although the administration says it still hasn’t decided whether to arm rebel forces there.

FUKUSHIMA, Japan — In the shadow of Japan’s struggle to stem radioactive leaks from its stricken nuclear complex, police in white moon suits pull bodies of tsunami victims from an evacuated zone in halting work interrupted by radiation alarms.

H/T Char

— SF Gate Low levels of radiation found in US milk – Very low levels of radiation turned up in a sample of milk from Washington state, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday, but federal officials assured consumers not to worry.

The drumbeat from Latin America’s friends of tyranny club has continued in recent days

2. Chavez of Venezuela and Christina Fernandez de Kirchner of Argentina stepped up their criticism of U.S. actions in Libya.

3. Castro, in his latest reflections, compared U.S.–NATO actions in Libya with the Fascists/Nazi attacks on Republican Spain in the 1930s.

4. Bolivia’s Evo Morales demanded that President Obama be stripped of the Nobel Peace prize.

:: Cash for Clunkers 2: The Return of Government Motors ::

Senator Stabenow introduces her legislation, the Charging America Forward Act, to speed up tax incentives for the purchase of electric vehicles.

— Report Accuses DHS of Witness Tampering and Attempted Theft of Congressional Committee Documents – A key congressional committee on oversight is accusing the Department of Homeland Security of non-cooperation, witness tampering and even attempted theft of committee documents.

— CFP {Pelosi blowing smoke} Obama’s ineligibility for dummies

On August 28, 2008, Representative Nancy Pelosi, then Chair of the Democratic National Convention signed an official Certification of Nomination verifying that Barack Obama was legally qualified to serve as President of the United States under the provisions of the United States Constitution.

Wisconsin’s Republican leaders are taking the same confident and bullish approach to implementing their divisive collective bargaining law that they took to passing it, suggesting they may ignore a judge’s warning there would be consequences for moving ahead while challenges to the law are pending.

(CNN) Columbus, Ohio — In their bruising fight over collective-bargaining rights with Ohio’s governor, police and firefighter unions have put their battle cry on a bumper sticker, “Help the Middle Class, Ticket Kasich.”

Is it a case of legitimate discrimination? Or a Justice Department out of control? Those are two of the questions surrounding the case of Safoorah Khan, a 29-year-old math teacher and devout Muslim who, until December of 2007, taught at the MacArthur Middle School in Berkeley, Ill.

— Liberals Press Obama to Dump GE CEO From Economic Panel – The head of GE and FOB (Friend of Barack) is facing backlash from left-leaning groups who say that Jeffrey Immelt shouldn’t be on the White House Jobs Council or any other panel in light of reports that the company last year made $14.2 billion in profit, paid zero in corporate federal taxes and actually received a $3.2 billion tax benefit.

The battle in Congress got particularly heated today when Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer was caught on tape on a conference call urging fellow Dems to blame the Tea Party for a possible shutdown.

Dem Caucus instructs how to strategy:

So much for civil discourse. Sen. Charles E. Schumer briefly revealed his true face Tuesday as reporters listened to him instruct fellow Democrats in how to paint Republicans and House Speaker John Boehner as extremist Tea Party zealots in the budget debates.

“I always use the word extreme,” Schumer told his fellow Democrats. “That is what the caucus instructed me to use this week.”

“Chuck Schumer did us a favor. He exposed their tactic. He’s telling his members to deem any spending cut as unreasonable. I don’t see how we can do anything if they’re not set serious.” Cantor said.

Schumer had scheduled a conference call with reporters, but apparently didn’t realize journalists were already on and started giving off pointers on how to talk to reporters about the budget process.

Like many other news outlets, Fox News was rolling on the conference call ahead of time and caught the Schumer misstep.

He expressed appreciation for lawmakers getting on the call and then lashed into Republicans and told fellow Democrats that they should frame the GOP view as “extreme” and associated with the Tea Party.

“[I] always use the word extreme, that’s what the caucus instructed me to do the other week, extreme cuts and all these riders, and [House Speaker] Boehner’s in a box. But if he supports the Tea Party there’s going to inevitably [be] a shutdown,” Schumer could be heard saying.

At this point the line goes silent and reporters can be heard asking what happened and others remarking that they were listening to something that was not meant for them.

The call did finally go on as planned and the word “extreme” was eventually used. Democratic Sens. Boxer, Cardin, Carper and Blumenthal weighed in on the issue, stressing the urgency of the matter and that both sides will have to compromise.

Lawmakers are embroiled in a tough showdown over the budget, and facing another Continuing Resolution that will keep the government funded for a short amount of time or face a shutdown.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, also referenced the call in a news conference saying that while Schumer is framing the conversation, they’ve actually been doing leg work on the issue.

Republicans were emboldened after Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., was heard before the start of a conference call telling other Democrats that they should use the word “extreme” to describe Republican demands, because “that’s what the caucus instructed me to do the other week.”

Yesterday, Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) gave America some insight into his party’s game plan. The Washington Examiner reports that on a conference call yesterday, Schumer, without realizing reporters were already listening, instructed his fellow Democratic senators to tell the reporters that the GOP is refusing to negotiate. According to the Examiner, Schumer ”told the group to make sure they label the GOP spending cuts as ‘extreme.’” That is what “the caucus instructed [Schumer] to do last week.”

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Does Senator Charles Schumer have egg on his face tonight! This is one conference call the senator will never forget! He gave colleagues a pep talk before they spoke to the media. There’s only one problem. Journalists were already on the line and recording. Bachman’s take:

Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) just doesn’t have a strong grasp of the facts when it comes to Social Security and the debt. Yesterday, at a campaign rally calling on Congress to “Back Off” Social Security Reid again repeated his line that: “Social Security has not contributed one penny to the debt or the deficit.”